


grow (weeds and flame)

by biscuitswrites



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Sokka (Avatar), Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Dissociation, Gay Zuko (Avatar), M/M, Minor Jet/Zuko (Avatar), Minor Mai/Zuko, Panic Attacks, Slow Burn, Smart Sokka (Avatar), Tea Server Zuko (Avatar), except for the gay, lots of angst first tho
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:13:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 13,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26727256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/biscuitswrites/pseuds/biscuitswrites
Summary: In a world where your soulmates thoughts on you appear on your skin, Sokka and Zuko don't much like their soulmate. They like them even less after finding out who they are.For pulling them together through fate, the spirits don't seem sympathetic to their situation.It doesn't matter. They don't want each other anyways.
Relationships: Sokka/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 46
Kudos: 168





	1. the boy in the iceberg

For as long as he can remember, enemy has been written in bold letters on Sokka’s calf. He tries to ignore it, and it’s not like shorts are fashionable in the South Pole. So he deals with it, and averts his eyes. The problem is, sometimes useless rests in the crease of his elbow, and hindering on below the knuckle of his thumb. It never stays for more than a few minutes, like most thoughts pertaining to the concept of a soulmate instead of who they are. But it’s there. 

Sokka likes to entertain himself with tales of a tragically oppressed northern water tribe girl, sitting on a plane of ice believing her only option is an arranged marriage, that anything else is deviant. Believing her sister tribe is nothing but low life’s. He explains it away with an earth kingdom girl unimpressed by soldiers, wishing for war to stay away from her shores and the other kingdoms along with it. Wishing to love whichever politician or hunk they’ve found, before being swept into his own arms when the time came. 

He tells his insecurities away with fairy tales when he can’t sleep, or when he scratches at his calf. He writes fairytales of sparkles and light around neat black letters, tells it off and swallows what he knows deep somewhere, and focuses on brown hair or black? He knows she’ll be beautiful, and he wonders where the word will appear. 

// 

A servant runs up behind Ursa, tapping her on the shoulder.  
“Your child, his first soul mark.” There’s no emotion in their voice, but not much else can be expected. Ursa’s pace stays even. 

Zuko is five years old when bad is written on his shoulder blade. 

She hides the heartbreak on her face and smiles at her son’s first soul mark. She’d expected as much, being both the son of a tyrant and a soldier in a war, but it hurt. She smiles at the servants. 

“I’ll change Zuko from now on until he can do it himself, hmm?” She dismisses them with a wave of her hand and they bow out. 

“What does it mean mommy?” Zuko’s eyes were wide. 

“It means there’s someone out there who loves you very much. Even if they don’t know it yet.” 

Zuko wonders at his soulmark for most of his early years, poking and pushing and thinking. It says bad and villain and mean most of the time, but if stays up late and lights a candle, he can see beautiful press itself on his collar bone. 

Bad and villain and mean graduate into tyrant and evil, and irredeemable makes his thigh hurt. But he trusts his mother and her judgement and tries to not grow bitter. They’ll learn to love each other because that’s how life and the spirits circle each other, and no one could be that cruel. 

They’re at a dignitaries wedding and Zuko looks up at his mother. Everything is swirling around him in petals, soft warm candlelight clashing against the harsh moon behind them. His uniform is scratchy. 

“Are they soulmates?” His eyes are impossibly golden, impossibly rich and impossibly innocent, and Ursa can see the scars that will run across them and the pain that will run through them. 

“Many people choose to be friends with their soulmate, and they still have just as deep a bond.” She says it with tight lips, and Zuko knows it’s true, he just meant something else by the question. They both know it in the way Ursa shudders from Ozai’s touch behind her. 

“Soulmates make people weak. They’re useless and they’ll hurt you.” Azula nods at that and his tone is final, and Zuko trusts his mom, but he can feel iron gates shutting around his heart, can feel coldness seeping into his eyes. He can’t afford to trust. He can’t afford to be weak. He stands up straighter. 

//

“You’re banished,” Sokka tells the monk, and tries to ignore the look on his sister’s face. 

It’s a face he’s seen too many times, it’s a face when a kid touches someone’s arm and feels warmth and runs to her. She hugs them and says she’s happy, but Sokka always finds her in their hut, rocking back and forth. 

The face is more of a question then an emotion. How could spirits be so cruel, that a girl doesn’t have a soulmate. Why her. Why. It’s an excruciating question that has no answer, even when the next fishing trip is bountiful and the next breeze is warm. 

So Aang hugs her goodbye because Sokka will not cave, and the question turns to his cruelty and icing heart for his sister’s safety. He won’t think about enemy on his calf, and how it’s infinitely better than nothing, but how he’d trade places with his sister a million lifetimes in a heartbeat so when she pulled up her sleeve when she thought no one was watching, her face would go bright. 

Because Katara pulled the boy from the iceberg, and cut by her braid was pretty on the back of her neck, and Sokka ran towards them and placed Aang’s hand there. 

And Aang leaves, and Katara beats her brother's chest and all they’ll have is each other because it’s all they remember having. And the ice starts to crack beneath them. 

Sokka can feel his own mark shifting, and he holds his sister while she cries. 

“Wait!” He yells at the sky. 

The bison’s tail twitches, and a glider flies down. “You’re her soulmate,” Sokka looks down. “If being with you makes her happy, I’ll let you stay.” Even if it means she leaves me, and I’m left with bitter words and a bitter taste. 

Katara runs towards Aang and grabs his hand. “Sokka I-” but she doesn’t know what he wants to hear. 

“Stay in the village.” Stay, he thinks, turning away. 

He hikes towards the tower and pulls up his sleeve. He was right, it did shift. Close is sprawled on his wrist. He rubs at it absently. He doesn’t know what it means, and he can see smoke. The cracks are getting wider. 

He’ll fight. And maybe he’ll get injured. He looks at the size of the warship. He’s a warrior, he has to be, maybe he’ll get injured, maybe more. Maybe it won’t matter. 

Katara has someone new, and his father will honour his warriors death. The village won’t mourn the weird kid who was never quite anything, the kid who never found his soulmate, the kid always wrapped in rumours. 

They won’t miss him, but they’ll honour him, and that’s what he wants, so he’ll fight. 

He thinks about a girl somewhere with words sinking into skin, and he’s pretty sure she’ll be glad. 

The ground beneath him shudders. 

//

There’s a soldier running up the gangplank, but a better word might be boy. Unless the rest of the force is lying in wait, sending their weakest first, but there’s really nowhere to hide. The boy keeps charging. 

Foolish curves on Sokka’s neck, and rests under his necklace. 

//

Sokka is riding away with the avatar, and he can’t help but wonder who the boy leading the fire nation was. He couldn’t have been much older than him, and he wonders what he’s doing all the way out here. 

It’s a weird thing to focus on, but all the ice he ever knew is fading into ocean, and he turns it over in his head in lieu of looking over at his sister, who is looking at her soulmate, the avatar. 

He doesn’t look at the sea, and he doesn’t look at his sister. He closes his eyes, and he reels in his thoughts like he’s fishing. 

He plays with the hem of his pants, and he feels his soulmark shift.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi everyone! this is an au where soulmates exist, their thoughts on you show up on your skin, and if your soulmate touches your soulmark wherever it is, you feel a burst of warmth/ happiness!


	2. the warriors of kyoshi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> episode: the warriors of kyoshi

Suki was pretty. She was pretty and cute and surprisingly strong, and Sokka wants to grab her hand and a pot of ink and have her brush her own words over him, but unless she was ridiculously good at hiding her emotions, she wasn’t his soulmate. Which was fine, plenty of people turn out to be friends with their soulmates and pursue romantic relationships. Sure. 

“What are you thinking about Sokka?” Asks one of the Kyoshi Warriors- he’s pretty sure her name is Mai. He flashes her a smile. She came in to watch them a little while ago. He turns to her, dangling headpieces cutting his vision, and Suki lands a blow. 

She laughs. “Can’t let yourself get distracted hmm?” She says. “Let’s try again.” 

He nods, raising his fans. She circles him. Her moves aren’t delicate- there’s force behind them- but they’re graceful and pointed. Sokka wasn’t far off when he said they were dancing, the more he does it, the more drums play in the back of his head at a rhythm. It’s a dangerous way to fight if your enemy is smart enough to figure it out- but Sokka can see the appeal of the smoothness and ease. 

Suki hasn’t made a move yet. 

“Why do you that?” 

“What?” Sokka lowers his fans, and so does she. 

She smiles, stretching a bit. “You just stare,” she furrows her brows at him, “at nothing. It’s.. intriguing.” 

Sokka sighs. He gets away with it most of the time- but these girls are perceptive. He consciously moves his eyes from a gold piece on the wall to her face. 

“I don’t know. I just think a lot.” He thinks if he turned around Mai would be looking at him with concern, so he doesn’t. He raises his fans. “Again?” 

“Be careful Sokka.” She moves into a fighting stance. “That’s going to get you killed one day.” 

He knows he’s getting better even if he can’t see a quantifiable difference in his fighting- he’s beating Suki more. She lunges towards him, and Sokka flips her arm. Mai tuts behind them. 

“Something to add?” Suki says, blowing her hair out of her face.

“Sokka isn’t better than you at fighting- no one really is.” Suki stands up straighter, grinning. “But he’s beating you more. Sokka, I want to try something.” 

He glances at Suki, who shrugs, moving to grab some water. 

“Sokka, I’m going to use a different Kyoshi subset of moves. Okay?” Sokka shifts his feet. 

“Okay,” 

She runs at him with a forceful kick, which she rolls into a punch. Sokka can’t even see what’s coming at him, and within seconds he’s down. 

She offers him a hand, and he notices she’s reasonably taller than Suki. 

“We agree I can beat you?” 

Sokka rolls his eyes, flicking at the gold silk. “Yeah, yeah,” 

“Okay.” Sokka narrows his eyes. There’s no gloating there. “I’m going to fight how Suki was, and we both have the same subset of Kyoshi moves. This is the style I’m better at.” 

“Great,” he mumbles, “we’re just showing off how we can always beat up Sokka. Pick on the new guy.” Suki chuckles. “Real classy Mai.”

She shoves at him through a smile. “I’m serious. Ready?”

Sokka side steps her first few attacks, falling into the rhythm. She steps into a position for a lunge, and he breaks it, surprising her enough to knock her off her balance. 

He smirks. “C’mon, that can’t have been your better fighting style.” 

Suki coughs. “He’s not-“ she shakes her head. “He’s not good at it.” She turns to Mai, standing up with Sokka’s hand. “But that is your better style. I don’t-“ 

“Hey!” He squeaks, “I just beat her! I call that good!” Mai claps him on the shoulder. 

“You have promise- but you are by no means a master. But you beat me when I used a style you were familiar with.” She grins warmly at him. “Remember to use your brain when you’re fighting. It seems to be your biggest asset.” 

Sokka stretches an arm above his head, turning to admire the art on the wall now he’s stopped fighting long enough not to. “I can’t tell whether that’s a compliment or not.” 

Suki grabs him on the back. He startles at the contact, and he wishes he felt something, but he can’t even feel the warmth of her hand through the uniform. He wonders whether that’s the point. 

“It’s better than nothing. C’mon. I’m gonna change it up and kick your ass.” He notices the colour of the leaves in the tree in the tapestry are more teal than green, but it looks nice with the gold. He turns. 

//

A girl flies at him, but Zuko had seen her running down the path, her burning village framing her feet. His rhino pushes her out of the air with a flash of his rhino’s tail, he raises his arms to firebend, another girl stepping in front of his flames, fanning them away in a forceful swipe. Except- he has the same eyes as the boy from the boat, and when he growls, it’s definitely him. 

He lunges, and Zuko expects him to fly at him like the girl, so he turns around so his rhino can do the hard part. 

There’s no contact. 

The boy had feinted, and now he’s leaping up over the side of the rhino, and Zuko barely has time to push out a hand, before he’s grappled off of the beast. Two other warriors join him, and the boy backs away to tend to the girl on the ground. 

He may be wearing a dress, but he’s smarter than Zuko gave him credit for. 

//

Suki grabs his shoulders once they’re behind the house. She winces and puts one hand down to her side. “How’d you do that?” Her eyes widen, and a stream of makeup is wiped down her face. 

“I used my brain,” he grins, before clearing his throat. “I’m sorry. I treated you like a girl, when I should’ve treated you like a warrior.”

She tilts her head. “You wanted me to be your soulmate.” 

“How did you-” she smacks him lightly. 

“You’re not the only one with a brain. It’s okay. I am a warrior,” she leans in to kiss his cheek, “but I’m a girl too. I’ll see you again, Sokka.” She brushes a hand over his arm. 

All Sokka can see again is ocean, and it would be a comfort on any other day. There’s a design woven into Appa’s saddle. He’ll see Suki again, and maybe this time he won’t be a drag, and maybe that time he’ll have met his perfect soul mate, or maybe she’ll be the drag, and maybe Sokka will kiss Suki. He tries to count how far the pattern goes before restarting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter mostly sets up some sokka characterization,, as well as shows where I stand on suki, which is she is amazing and needs to be more appreciated in zukka fics.


	3. the winter solstice part two: avatar roku

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> episode: the winter solstice part 2: avatar roku

Sokka is in the fire nation, in a fire nation temple, being led by a good fire bender, and his thoughts are doing backflips trying to make all the words link up. 

He glances at his wrist before wiping the sweat off his forehead in the blistering hot volcano. It still just says close. It says that sometimes, and he can’t find any pattern in when it turns and changes, and with a lifetime of hate written over his skin, he can’t fathom what his soulmate is doing. 

It feels different this time, mostly it flickers to closer in a loose script, but now it's drawn and heavy. They’re convinced. It’s making him antsy, and the fact that they’re in the fire nation with this kind of certainty from them isn’t helping. 

//

His plan didn’t work. It should have! It was a good plan, getting Aang into the room, but then Roku showed up, and all that was left of plans was the superhuman. The temple is crumbling, and he can’t find Aang. If he focuses on Katara stumbling beside him, or the threat of the prince being there, though all he seems to be doing is being thrown around like a rag doll, or the fact that the literal temple they’re in is crumbling, he’s going to go into overdrive. He has to solve one problem at a time. 

Aang. 

He scans the room again, but all he can see is a milky fog that poured in, and he feels like he’s on an ice floe in the middle of a blizzard. He chokes on the thick air, and realizes he can barely see anyone. 

“Katara?” he calls, panicked. They’re outnumbered here- if they stay together they can do something, and he wonders how effective Katara’s waterbending could prove. He runs his hand over the rim of his shirt, playing with a loose thread he finds. Aang. 

There’s a shout from beside him, and he stumbles, waving a hand in front of his face. 

“Hey!” there’s a figure on the ground, and he reaches out unthinkingly, assuming that all the enemy has left. 

They haven’t. It’s Zuko. 

In his shock, he forgets to retract his hand, and the prince grabs it without noticing the blues of the watertribe, murky as they are through the smoke. 

Sokka feels his own insides turn to ash. Zuko must have firebended, or something, because there’s lightning shot straight through his stomach, and syrup shot straight through his brain. 

He thinks someone poured plaster made of sunshine over his wrist. 

Soulmate. 

Zuko. 

“No,” he mutters, pulling back his hand. Not happening. And its all he can think, because thinking about anything else when all his thoughts are Zuko and soulmate- not happening. 

Zuko’s mouth is open, and Sokka’s fingers have dug themselves into his palms. 

“It can’t be you.” Zuko says, and Sokka can hear it over the roar of the flames. Sokka thinks he can hear every emotion crossing the boy's face. 

Smoke is winding around him, and he can barely tell it apart from his soulmark feathering over his skin. 

Neither of them has moved away, and Sokka’s palms are bloody. 

Soulmate. 

Soulmate and fire nation and enemy, they’re all tied up in his vision. His future is tangled and tainted, and the only one he can see ends in heartbreak.

He might’ve said he was sorry, but Katara was pulling him away, and Zuko was running away, and he was Zuko, and Sokka wasn’t sorry. 

His legs are filled like they’re buzzing, and Katara is talking and so was Aang, because he was back. 

Sokka’s thoughts are caught in a spiral that only ends in flame in ash, and all the paths he can see end in it too. 

He remembers when his dad told him the spirits were never wrong and just had funny ways of showing it, but none of this is funny to him, though he’s sure there’s some evil spirit laughing somewhere. 

It’s the first time he thinks his dad is irrevocably wrong. 

Because the only other option is him being right, and- he thinks of Zuko. No. 

Not happening.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the spirits said: youre soulmates  
> they said: no <3
> 
> this is a bit of a shorter one.. but it's an important one


	4. the storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> episode: the storm  
> TW for this chapter! Sokka is apathetic towards death and can be read as portraying suicidal tendencies, and Zuko is shown having a panic attack and dissociating.

Sokka can feel the sun on his neck as he wanders the stalls of the port. It’s pointless, they ran out of money days ago. But there’s nothing else they can do here, and every time he stops moving, his limbs go heavy like they’re trying to sink right through the cracks in the boardwalk. 

Every time he stops moving, his thoughts catch up to him, and along with them, a certain scarred prince. 

He thinks it’s a joke, because of course it has to be. He doesn’t think about how, if it didn’t mean they weren’t soulmates, all the words would make sense. 

The sun is still on his neck, and he tries not to think of the warmth that was shot through him. 

He idly picks up a bowl from in front of him, woven. The seller proudly proclaims it’s water tight, and he bites back a bitter comment of how, with his waterbending sister and the goddamned avatar, this bowl can probably do more than him. 

Theoretically, he’s the plan guy, the weapons guy. But planning can only go so far, and isn’t that a lesson they’re all learning, stuck in this shit port as they are. Weapons can only go so far against the supernatural. 

Really, he’s useless, and his soulmark tends to agree with him. Closer flickers on his wrist sure, but useless still presents itself. So does hindering, and all the other adjectives that are easier to brush off when you can spin stories instead. 

He does get a job, with some old fisherman who’s crazy wife thought there would be a storm. It’s a last ditch attempt to prove that he’s what is going to get them moving, get them going. They can laze in the port, and he’ll work, and they’ll need him. 

It’s a plan. Sure. 

//

When the storm does come, he’s almost happy. Fishing was excruciatingly boring, and he’s good at this. It’s something he can do, something he can fix. 

The boat is different from the one they use at home, but the ocean still tastes like salt, and the ropes here are worn too. When a wave crashes out of his vision, he can almost hear his father yelling along with it. 

The sea is inky black and angry, and Sokka thinks it’s good. Sokka thinks it’s a challenge. 

The seas are full of spirits, and if he had less pride he’d yell at them, because what else can they do? Take away his life- he’s useless. Take away his soulmate? 

Sokka thinks they already have. 

The next wave breaks over the deck, and the cold feels clean, like the salt is scrubbing at him. 

The next wave glows with lightning behind it, and the seas are full of spirits.

It’s a challenge. 

He winds the rope around his wrist. 

//

Zuko can hear the thrumming of rain against the metal, a horrible cacophony, with none of the melody storms in the caldera blew through the halls. Back there, the thrashing of trees was dancing, but here he is, in a twisting belly of metal, where all he can hear are echos. 

He wants to run until his lungs ache like he was breathing fire. He wants to runs until each step feels like the drop of a stone. He wants to run until he can’t remember how it felt to be still and stagnant and helpless. 

He settles for opening the door of his room. He settles for opening the next one, and the next. His steps clang unnaturally, and the soles of his shoes catch on the grates in the metal. 

He can hear his uncle down in the common area, voice moving through pitches like he’s telling a story. He hears his name, and he hears the words firelord and war room and father said in a combination. 

He wants to run. 

//

He was right in thinking the ship here was different. It wasn’t made for stormy seas, and Sokka peers into the onslaught and realizes he’s met his match. 

The boat rocks, and he feels the vertigo of when he pushed his little sister just too hard, when the next ice floe was a little too far, but his hand is already out, and his feet have already left the ground. 

And- it’s fine. He can’t feel panic or adrenaline with everything else pressing at his skin, with everything else filling up his skull. 

It’s fine.

The fisherman is yelling, the storm is raging, and Sokka is going to die. These are all facts, and they calm the hypotheticals calling for attention. 

Facts. The sea is a shade of blue that’s deep, and it reminds him of the furs that when he put his hand in, he could just keep going. Katara is his sister. Katara will miss him, but her soulmate is the avatar, and they each have more than each other. 

Sokka’s soulmate is a fire nation prince. 

For the first time, it rings in his head as a fact. 

//

Zuko’s head is in his hands, and all the air in the room is being pulled into his lungs. His hands hurt, and his chest hurts, and if all he wanted from running was exertion, his wish would be fulfilled. 

But he’s stuck in a dead end hall way, a dead end hallway in a ship on the ocean. His vision is swimming and he forgets what port they left, forgets where he is, forgets.. more. There’s blank spaces in his memory, and his hands are out of focus. 

There’s a black spot on them where there’s never been one before. Focus. Focus. 

He narrows his eyes, closing his damaged one that doesn’t really work right anyway. 

Sad. It’s not in the bold script he’s used to, it’s in a sad, scrawny handwriting. His soulmate- no one. Just his soulmate, thinks he’s sad, or will be, or was. It’s not refreshing, but it’s different, and it’s enough to focus on, and when he looks up, he can see the plates in the wall. When he walks, his muscles don’t clench underneath him. 

There’s a crash above decks, the storm has finally hit them then. He walks up, and his soulmark is feathering enough that Zuko is sure he’s being thought about, but it’s not any of the places he’s familiar with. It never moves to far on his knee, and sad returns over and over, and it starts to feel like base in the game of tag he played as a kid, the one where Azula would always change the rules. 

They never tried to stop her though. 

He opens the door, and is immediately met with an onslaught of rain. There’s shouting, and he’s not exactly sure where it’s coming from. The noise and the rain, it’s crashing, and the waves are cresting, huge in a way that feels unstoppable. He takes a deep breath, the kind uncle would give him a smile for. The kind that pushes out the sound, the panic. 

He feels his soulmark move again, slow. It’s right where the side of his hip meets the side of his thigh, and he recognizes it, from nights he stayed up for the precious words of beauty only nighttime brought. It says alone. 

It feels like a statement of present, though Zuko isn’t sure what brought it on. It’s true to their future, or lack thereof, but now? 

Another crash reminds him of the rain running a line down his back, of the way the ship lurches uncertainly beneath him. 

“The helmsman!” Someone yells. 

Zuko doesn’t hesitate, he clambers up the slick ladder. They’re not the most upstanding crew, but they’re his, and that’s no longer true for a lot of things he took for granted. It only seems right to make the effort.

Back with everyone on solid ground, or as solid as you can get on a ship, their situation still hasn’t improved. They’re still rocking on unfeeling waters, and Zuko is unsure as to how much he cares. The sea can’t feel it when it hurts him, and he’ll feel every bit of it. 

He can take it. 

He looks around at the crew- can they? Does he want them to? He was right when he said he had to find the avatar, but if he doesn’t have anyone to find the avatar with..

“Into the eye of the storm!” He calls. His uncle nods in approval, and the crew moves around, making the necessary adjustments. The storm doesn’t lessen, and the sky doesn’t lighten, but something deep inside Zuko is unwinding forcefully at this decision. He paces a bit, even steps to keep from slipping, and winds the tightness back in. 

He can see a pillar of light ahead of them, and breathes out, finally bothering to wipe the rain dripping down his forehead out of his eyes. 

“Almost there,” he mutters. Almost somewhere, at least, but he still feels far from everything else. The avatar. His soulmate. The latter doesn’t matter. 

A flash of cream streaks the sky, and he must’ve summoned it. The flying bison appears above their heads, and with it, the avatar, and with him, the water tribe boy. 

He meets his eyes as he turns to fly away, and he’s turned around in the saddle, back of his fur coat flying in his face as he looks at him. They lock eyes and it’s not understanding, it’s not anything more than looking at each other. 

There’s not much more it could be. 

The boy's sister tugs at his sleeve, and he turns.

“Let’s get the ship to safety,” he says, “and make repairs.” It’s not anything similar to mercy, it’s not even a reprieve, it’s a rest. 

Soulmates are looked down upon in the fire nation, as are ties to anyone. But for the first time, he finds himself wondering about the crew’s. They haven’t been home in three years either, he realizes. 

He wonders why his leg said alone, and he scratches at his knee. Far. For as far as he feels, he thinks the waves pulled him under.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really watched sokkas master and went ape shit on his feelings huh?  
> also, this is my first posted fic.. ao3 formatting is slowly killing me.


	5. the forest (bonus episode)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this one doesn't have a episode equivalent.. sokka and zuko have a chance meeting in a forest

Zuko is aching to run. He doesn’t think it's from anything, but instincts have surprised him before. If he walks around his room one more time, he’s going to scream, which wouldn’t be so bad except for the earful he’d get from Uncle. 

So he opens the door. 

It creaks, the hideous sound of metal resting in every corner of the ship, and it only serves to remind him of the metal plates in his room, sheets of emptiness that do nothing to clear out his brain. 

He’s covered them in drapery in a poor mockery of the fine silks they had in the palace. He misses the way that you could find things there, misses the colour and detail poured into everything. His mother used to walk him through the halls and tell him of this artifact and that one, and he misses the way her voice only reached his ears in the echoing hall. 

He could still see spirits passing through the palace, the past and the present and everything swimming through it that belonged there. The artifacts left at a faster rate once his mother died, lost in terrible raids that never took anything but them. 

When he was lonely, he used to walk the halls and remind himself of the people who lived here, of how that tree was allegedly grown when a servant spilt the finest tea, and how that window was the only of it’s wing to survive a storm, and he made friends. 

He misses the palace, and he misses the carachter. This ship was built no more than ten years ago, the only spirits aching sailors. He taps a hand a against the wall and it rings. Metal. 

The moon hangs above him as he lowers himself off the gangplank, swords strapped to his back, fire ready in his throat. 

He turns towards the forest. If he’s going to be up at this hour, may as well make more use of it than sword practice. How is he meant to sit, to be still, when the person who could fix this, is sitting somewhere in that forest, or past it? He could be flying away in whichever direction strikes his fancy, unbothered by borders and seas. 

Zuko can see every close call he’s had played on his eyelids. Every time a flash of orange and a giggle dangerously close, fire flakes on his tongue and echoing halls, but it slips. The avatar’s childish laugh fills the space they’re in, and there’s no spirit that hasn’t seen him fail, no time of day left to impress. 

He calls back the fire licking up his arm unconsciously, compressing into a ball in his palm, lighting the branches only far enough to show how hopeless he is. 

Zuko searches the woods, holding his swords out in front of him in arcing sweeps. 

There’s a crack behind him, and he spins around, pinning someone up to a tree with his sword, the other curled in flame. 

“You!” He yells, sword dipping in surprise at the distinct water tribe clothes. 

Sokka is smart. He’s on his back, boomerang (useless weapon) pressed to his throat, swords clattered across the dirt, fire outshone by moonlight. 

“You!” Sokka’s teeth are bared, eyes narrowed. “Why are you here?” The boomerang has a blunt edge, but it’s not much comfort. He swallows. Stupid boy. Why would Zuko tell him? Zuko doesn’t owe him anything. 

“Answer me!” His voice is shaking, and it’s not anger, it’s fear. “I’ll cut your throat,” he growls. Tight voice. Bared teeth. Stupid water tribe boy. The fire is pushing at his throat. 

// 

Sokka is pinning his arms to the ground with his knees, but Zuko is a fair amount taller, and he’s angry. 

To be fair, so is Sokka. 

In his kicking, Zuko hits the back of Sokka’s calf, and enemy is written there. 

Sokka rolls off in shock, shaking the warmth out of his head, picking up a still glowing sword. It’s heavier than it looks. He shakes his head again, turning to where Zuko is circling. 

“Why are you here? Where’s the avatar?” Zuko’s voice is hoarse and yelling. Sokka lunges with the sword, only to be easily disarmed. He was expecting that. Plan. He needs a plan, but all of him wants to roll zuko to the ground and punch him. He clenches his fists. 

He throws his boomerang, already reaching for his club. Zuko is blasting fire, and it's drowning everything he’s trying to think. 

“Where?” He’s bellowing, and Sokka is backing up towards the shaking tree. 

The sword is back on his throat. 

“All I need is the avatar,” he flips his (ugly, dumb) ponytail, “so why are you here?” His eyes are narrowed, and there’s an intensity in the turn of his lips. 

“Why YOU?” Heat is blowing out of his breath. “I don’t,” sword, “need,” closer, “you.” A line of red at his throat. 

He raises his chin. “What,” he tries for a smirk, tries for smugness. “Am I not good enough?” 

“No. You’re not.” Entitled rich prince, alway getting what he wants. This close to Zuko, Sokka wonders which word just made its appearance on his skin. 

“You wound me.” His plan isn’t working. Zuko isn’t yelling. He needs him unhinged and angry and mad. He has a plan. 

“You sure you’re not soulmates with the avatar? You think about him enough.” 

Warm metal, warm neck. 

“Shut up. You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Zuko is leaning closer. Zuko is getting all up in his face. 

Sokka grins. “Don’t I?” Low voice. Sultry. He leans forward, trying to hide how repulsed he is from his features. Trying to hide how repulsed he should be. He doesn’t think repulsive is written on Zuko, but he doesn’t know what else could be. 

“Shut up!” Zuko leans back, air creeping against Sokka’s neck. “Why did it have to be you here- of all people?” 

Sokka’s hand moves to the hilt of the sword, and Zuko’s face moves to the spirits, to the sky. 

“Why did it have to be you!” 

//

Sokka wrenches himself out of his grip with force Zuko didn’t know he carried, and he’s the one against the tree. 

Sokka’s laughing, and for a moment, he sounds like Azula. 

“You think I wanted to be here?” Crazed eyes, crazed laugh. 

“You, you what? You think I wanted this?” Zuko still hasn’t used his firebending. 

“You think I wanted you?” Sokka takes a breath, and Zuko isn’t sure he can do the same. He tries to snarl, clutching his ribs as best he can from his position. 

Sokka takes his swords, and another deep breath. Zuko has opportunities, closed eyes, backs turned, has had them the whole fight. 

Hes stopped using his firebending, his hands hanging at his sides. 

“Get out of here,” says Sokka, “Scram.” 

Zuko, leaning against the tree, kindles a fire up his arm. “Scared?”

Sokka sighs, hefting his swords. They glint in moonlight and fire, and Zuko can see he has a basic form in his movements. 

He flexes his hands, fire shifting to be held tightly in daggers behind his wrist.

Zuko is the prince of the fire nation. 

Sokka is nobody- no one important anyways. 

They circle each other, and Zuko is the first one to charge.

//

He is scared, but it doesn’t matter. Scared is a reaction, and what he needs are facts because once he starts thinking about how scared he is, he starts to think about why. It's a thought process that inevitably leads to fire. 

There’s some right there. He can skip the thinking. 

He sidesteps Zuko’s first attack, and it’s sloppy, much sloppier than the quick and controlled bursts he’s used to from him. 

He may be outmatched, but he’s not outwitted. 

Zuko is angry and hot headed at the best of times, and he clearly hasn’t slept. Sokka is focused on staying alive, and Zuko is focused on a distant goal. 

If he can keep a clear head, he can make it. He digs in his heels. 

But Zuko is standing there, breathing hard, (mouthbreather) and wearing fire nation clothes, and Sokka wants to throw a punch. Sokka wants him to hurt. 

Sokka wants to stay alive, just a bit more. 

“That the best you can do?” he calls, swinging both swords. He’ll have to use them both. 

Zuko shoots forward head first, though he’s clearly not using it. 

Sokka pushes his hand aside with one of the swords, and Zuko banks on it, focusing his attack on disarming him. Sokka brings down his other sword, punting Zuko to the ground. 

“Get. Out.” he growls. “You haven’t slept in days, and this isn’t how I kill you.” It occurs to him that in all the paths of heartbreak, in all the moves that end in flame and fire, that’s one of them. Swords and blood spilt on pale skin. 

A yell tears out of Zuko’s throat, fire pouring from his feet, knocking Sokka off of his own. He raises his swords above his face, a punch landing next to his ear. Sokka grabs it, wrenching his arm so he lands on Zuko. 

Pressed against him like this, he can feel warmth that’s slowly becoming familiar pouring into his bloodstream like tea on a bitter night. 

He can’t imagine ever killing this. 

But Zuko being anything other than an enemy is unthinkable, so he brings up his anger. 

“Just give it up already!” He lowers his sword enough that Zuko grabs it, so he leverages the other one under one and throws them both into the bush beside them. 

//

“I don’t quit.” He waves a fist full of flame at Sokka, who rolls off of him. “I can’t.” He wasn’t thinking clearly. He won’t. But not thinking clearly often translates into speaking clearly, to speaking truth. 

Or so his uncle says. 

He throws the fire, and Sokka ducks under it, tackling him. 

“Just leave us alone!” there’s no bared teeth, no threat, just every emotion laid bare in the fall of his fists. 

Zuko reaches for his swords, but wherever they are, they’re out of reach. 

“Leave me alone!” Yelling boy. Falling tears, falling fists. Sokka is punching at him, and Zuko doesn’t flinch, even at the ones landing next to his face. 

“I’ll leave you alone!” he’s yelling too. “I’ll do it gladly! I don’t want you!” Zuko is beating his chest right back. “I don’t want anything to do with you!” A fist falls into warmth, and Zuko pulls back. “Not now, and not ever!” Sokka’s face hasn’t changed. 

“That suits me! I never want to see you again!” Sokka is still hanging over him, his voice thick. 

Their fists start to come slower. It’s easier not to flinch. Zuko lights a candle in his hand, and Sokka closes his fist, extinguishing it. 

Hand in hand. 

Sokka moves off of Zuko. 

Zuko pushes himself up, but the flame he summons is quickly blown out. A weight has tied itself to his limbs, to his eyelids. 

Sokka walks away, and Zuko thinks that maybe strong is somewhere on his skin as well as in it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have the whole timeline of this fic planned, and this is one of my fave chapters,, there's just a lot of feelings happening.  
> this chapter was also part of the reason the kyoshi chapter was so long.. no offence to my boy but canon s1 sokka probably would not have won this fight.


	6. the blue spirit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> episode: the blue spirit

Zuko is going to lose everything, and all he can manage to do is pace. Zhao has the avatar. Zhao has the avatar in a high security prison. He’s going to lose it all, his honour, his throne, his country- he’s already lost his hope. Once the dust settles- sure. He’ll have his life. He’ll probably have his uncle. But in the face of a crown, he can’t equate that to much, especially when his life has been proven to be worth so little. 

He’s still alive though, and that’s a chance, but it’s far from hope. 

He pulls on a shirt in his chambers. Black. He doesn’t have hope, but he has a shot. 

The avatar is alive too. That’s all that matters. 

His bicep says earth, in wavy letters, flashing there before moving. Earth? He’s about as far from being earth kingdom as he can get. 

He can’t let it distract him. Especially not today. He either wins, or he doesn’t. 

He and the avatar, they’re both alive. He has a shot. 

It’s most of what matters. 

// 

Breaking in was stupidly easy, getting around once inside- even easier. 

“Typical cocky Zhao,” he mutters, before quickly biting his tongue. There’s no one in this hall way, or the next. 

It’s so quiet in the hall ways he can pretend he’s in the palace, pretend he hears wind rustling the drapery, pretend he smells food steaming from the kitchens. 

The colours are the same here, but there aren’t any windows. 

He focuses on something else to keep his steps in pace, to keep his tread quiet. The walls look of home.. his soulmark moves again, to nowhere he recognizes. 

It’s clunky, the way it moves, falling with heavy footsteps. It’s distracting. 

He makes it to where the avatar is being kept. For a high security prison, the guards are child’s play- and it doesn’t make sense. 

The doors open, and he sees the avatar. 

He raises his fists to break the chains, and he sees him flinch. 

The avatar’s eyes open, and he sees a child. 

He moves forward gruffly. He doesn’t have time to think. The avatar is going straight back to prison- but this time it’ll be his. 

The avatar is straining against him, even though he just saved him. What more does he want?

“Please! I need those frogs!” Zuko bites his tongue and shakes his head, continuing to drag him along. “For my friends! They’re sick!”

Zuko pauses. Aang notices. 

“Yeah! They can’t even stand up and-”

A guard turns the corner and they have other things to worry about. The avatar is a powerful fighter, only enhanced by the fact that no one has encountered an air bender for any fighter’s lifetime. 

They make it out. But Zuko keeps slipping, and the avatar keeps covering. The avatar said them- and he only has two companions so it must include.. him. 

He tries to deny it headspace, he’s fighting his way out of a prison designed to keep in the avatar, and he can't use his firebending. He has other things to worry about. 

But he keeps worming his way through his skin by virtue of being on it, and Zuko wants to see the avatars' companions.. out of harm's way. 

He doesn’t see the arrow until it’s too late. 

//

He wakes up- and he keeps his eyes shut, a testament to his training. 

He remembers the Avatar and Zhao and an arrow, and wherever he is his fate. He needs to figure out his surroundings. 

He feels leaves beneath him. It’s not stone, not wood, not a scratchy pallet. It’s not prison- and it’s not home. 

He breathes out. He still has a shot. 

Sunlight is filtering through his eyelids. How long have I been out? 

He doesn’t have any immediate injuries. He’s not bound by anything, and he can feel the ribbon of his mask on his neck, but it’s not pulled over his face. 

There’s someone breathing a few feet away. There’s someone there. 

He opens his eyes. 

//

He allows himself a moment of introspection as he changes back into clothes befitting a prince. 

In the end- in the end it hadn’t been a choice, as much as he can hear a voice listing all the tactics he could have employed on a monologuing avatar. 

The avatar had been talking, had been talking about something as inconsequential as friendship. 

That was the problem wasn’t it? The avatars friends. That was the crux. 

The avatar could outrun him. It had been proven. 

Zuko wouldn’t go down without a fight. It had been decided. 

The avatar’s friends were deadly sick.

Zuko wanted his soulmate to live. 

The avatar returned to his friends, his real ones, brought them the medicine. Zuko would return home with the avatar one day, and the boy would discover there was nothing for anyone in the fire nation- least of all friendship.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a shorter one.. but it got across what it had to :)
> 
> (also! i've been posting out the chapters I've had pre written all night, so the next chapter will be the first to be written right before posting,,)


	7. bato of the water tribe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I’m putting the episodes as the chapter titles now, but for old times sake,  
> episode: bato of the water tribe 
> 
> I dont think any TWs for this one! as of right now, I’m not planning anything that will be any worse than what we’ve seen so far, but I will continue individually tagging each chapter. dont hesitate to tell me if I miss anything!

“For Sokka, the mark of the wise.” Sokka preens under Bato’s hand brushing the mark across his forehead. There are waves lapping behind him, and southern water tribe food in his stomach, and he feels happy. 

He feels how he felt when the prince touched his soulmark. 

He’s going to focus on the fact that he feels full in a way he hasn’t in a while. He’s going to focus on Bato’s voice proclaiming his friends. And Aang talking. He turns to his friend's voice, surprised at his willingness to interrupt the ceremony. 

“I don’t deserve this,” he mutters. Katara turns to him, eyes already softening in the way that makes Sokka want to swim her right back to the north pole. 

“What do you mean Aang?” Sokka can see the way her blue eyes are catching in the sunlight, reflecting the sea behind them. Sokka can see the way Aangs enchanted, and looks away.

“I,” he turns away. “I’ve been keeping something from you.” he pulls out a crumpled piece of paper and throws it at Sokka. There’s smudges of the marks of the trusted blurring his arrow. 

“This is,” Sokka runs his fingers over it, “this is a map to our dad!” he yells, Katara grabbing at the map. 

“You have to understand-” 

“No. I don’t.” Sokka turns, hiking his bag up over his shoulder. “I’m leaving. Go to the north pole yourself.” 

“Sokka-” Bato starts. 

“No! I’m not a forgiving person.” He doesn’t know what he wants that to mean when he thinks about fire nation princes. “Go to the north pole yourself.” he says. 

“Katara, are you in?” 

There’s a beat as a wave hits the shore. He pictures Katara looking at her soulmate, and he tries not to think of what he’s asking of her. Another wave hits the shore and splashes against Aang’s ankles where he’s backed down the sand. The wave lets go. 

“I’m in.” 

//

Sokka has collected his things, and his bag is heavy on his back. He fiddles with the holes he made in the map. Bato is somewhere thanking his hosts. Katara is somewhere talking to her soulmate. 

She’s thanking him, or saying sorry, or something. Sokka doesn’t care enough to listen. 

Sokka doesn’t want to think about his sister looking at her perfect soulmate who’s touch fills her with nothing but joy. 

Because they’re always together. Because they fit together the way soulmates are supposed to. 

Sokka calls for her, and she walks away. They both ignore the tears she wipes from her eyes. 

//

To his credit, Bato waits until they’re out of earshot before tearing into Sokka. 

“I have half a mind to take away your mark!” Bato huffs, waving his good arm. “The wise? Be rational. He just didn’t want you to leave!” 

Sokka doesn’t listen. If he was being rational, he’d be on the Avatar’s bison, his sister would be talking to Aang about the next island they were going to visit, they’d all be together. Sokka, his sister, and her soulmate. He doesn’t want to get left behind either. So no. He refuses to be rational. 

“Think about what you’re asking from Katara,” he says, grabbing Sokka’s shoulder. Katara is pointedly slowing her pace, the gravel crunching beneath her slowing to a stop. 

“Leaving her soulmate?” Bato continues. Sokka shakes his hand off his shoulder, nails tearing through the paper in his hands. 

“She didn’t have to come with me.” I didn’t have to go with her. 

“Sokka! She’s your family! What, you want your sister who finally found her soulmate to have to choose between her family and him?” 

Yes, Sokka wants to yell. Sokka wants to yell so loudly that every emotion pours straight out of his throat and coats everyone else's. He wants to let out so much anger the trees flatten out around him. 

Sokka wants someone to hurt the way he does. 

Because choosing Katara, and choosing Aang? It’s not a choice. He’ll choose them everytime. 

But it hurts. 

It hurts so much in a way Sokka didn’t know anything could. It hurts in his legs with every step away from him he takes. It hurts in his hands, in his knuckles. 

And Sokka doesn’t need it to. Sokka never wants to choose him. 

Sokka isn’t a forgiving person. 

He’s not a vengeful one either. 

He looks at his sister. “C’mon,” he says. “Let’s get you back to your boyfriend huh?” 

“Not my boyfriend,” but she’s smiling, and it’s good enough for Sokka. 

//

The shirshu doesn’t slow down. It's a fearsome beast, and Zuko is glad he’s riding on top of it instead of being hunted. 

Through the trees, he sees a flash of blue. June sees it too, cracking her whip above the shirshu’s head. 

“That your girlfriend?” June says. “No wonder she left, she’s too pretty for you.” 

Zuko doesn’t grace that with a response. His hand goes to his soulmark, resting on his shoulder. He drops off the shirshu. 

“Where is the avatar?” He yells, grabbing the girl by her dress and pulling her to his face. 

The boy responds. “He’s gone. We split up.” There’s a line of bitterness through his words. Split up? He wouldn’t. He’s tracked them too far. This boy has come too far with zuko hot on his heels to just.. stop. It itches at the back of his throat like a cough laced with sparks. 

He would laugh, but he can feel the shirshu at his back with June surely atop it, and he’s a prince. 

He doesn’t laugh, he smiles with a hint of malice, of manic. “You think I’m stupid then?” He drops the sister to stalk towards the boy. “You of all people should know how dangerous it is to underestimate an opponent.” 

The boy catches his meaning, but he doesn’t drop his eyes. He hums thoughtfully, Adam’s apple dipping into it. 

Zuko didn’t see his hand moving towards his sister. They’re running, and they never stood a chance, not against the shirshu. He scoops them up easily, trying to be careful where he touches the boy. Judging by his pursed lips and general lack of commentary, he thinks he’s being careful too. 

Good. Soulmarks may feel nice in theory, but this boy is a pointless distraction. He’s glad they’re on the same page. 

He knows that feeling will get under his skin if he lets it. A weakness. 

Zuko refuses it, and doesn’t look at the boy as they ride towards the avatar. 

//

Zuko didn’t realize until the avatar was escaping, (again, because he just wasn’t good enough) that if this water tribe boy leaves the avatar, that’s it. Because Zuko can’t divert his course for anything, not even his soulmate. Least of all, his soulmate. 

He recognizes the feeling at the back of his throat. It tastes like all the times he turned over in his mind the only memories of his mother. 

Now, he locks them away. The boy is on a bison with the avatar, (because they escaped). There’s two parts to that sentence, and when he meditates, he tries to narrow it down to one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am genuinely so sorry it took me a month to write and is so short. This is my first posted fic, and it was much more nerve wracking than I thought it would be once I got through my pre written stuff. If anyone stuck around, thank you! It was your guy’s comments and kudos that got me back to writing <3


	8. the deserter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sokka forms some opinions during a venture into a fire nation town. 
> 
> No TWs as far as I know! Lmk if I missed anything as always

Since travelling the earth kingdom with the avatar, Sokka is reasonably sure bending isn’t magic. 

Reasonably sure. There’s no explanation for it as far as he can tell, no precedent other than it just is. He didn’t get this smart by not questioning things, after all. 

But Aang dragged them to the fire nation festival, a battle already lost before it began, his sister going soft around her eyes at the look turned on her. They came for Aang’s firebending- allegedly- and it’s red as far as the eye can see. Sokka’s legs are coiled in tension, the crowd grating on his nerves. He tries to count how many lanterns are hung on each strand. 

But. He’s starting to think that bending really is magic, because there’s no other explanation for the way the air is shimmering. In the South Pole, bending was magic because it was a rarity. 

Here in this red pocket cut into a forest, it’s its own kind of magic. Fire is shimmering in the air, and everyone is breathing it like it’s oxygen. Kids are leaning towards flame because they never learned to be afraid of it. It’s threaded through every action they make, heating food and distracting children. It’s threaded around them like a tapestry and Sokka’s breath catches on it. 

It’s beautiful. 

It feels like a fabled town, like the spirits walked out of the forest and made themselves at home. The air is alive, it’s electric, and they’re all strung by the hearts into each other in this swirling mass of flame. 

He turns, light casting off of gleaming stones like a puppet show. It looks like a scene out of a story gran gran used to tell them, where the spirits made a home on an icy peninsula and everything they touched was made of light. The buildings here are draped in lanterns, glowing from their cracks, from their insides. But she always described it as refracted. As glaring reflections off of ice flashing like anything they’ve dreamed. Incandescent, she’d say, and their breaths would catch. 

It was so bright that it drew the heat right out of the air, she’d say, puffing out a breath of steam they could see. 

Here, it’s bright because it’s warm. They’re interchangeable, bright and flushed and illuminated and warm. He’s wrapped in it, and Katara is too, her head spinning like she’ll never get enough of it. Aang is oblivious to their situation, running on feet that don’t seem to touch the ground. 

A few older ones are playing skip rope with fire an alley, and it’s gleaming off the walls in repetitive movements. Katara sees it too, and her fingers clench like she’s wishing she had her water skin to try it, but they agreed to leave it at camp for the sake of blending in. 

Fire is winding through people's legs and fingers like glowing ribbons, and Aang keeps laughing when it brushes past him. Sokka can’t see Katara’s face through the mask, but judging by her exasperated voice, it’s easing the crease between her eyebrows. Aang waves his arms at the next flame they see. 

“I’m already a master!” He laughs, muffled by the mask. Sokka is glad Aang can’t see his grin, he’d never shut up about his talents. 

Sokka grabs his shoulder, turning him away from the curious gazes he can feel on him like pin pricks at the back of his neck. “Soon enough wonder boy,” he huffs, and Aang drives a good natured elbow into his side before peeling off with Katara in tow. The lanterns above their heads flutter whenever Aang moves, and Sokka doubts whether either of them notice.

He’s just moved to find a stall selling food when he hears a cry beside him, a child tripping over a break in the stone path. He’s beside them in an instant. 

“Hey, it's okay,” he says, patting her on the head. The wobble on her lip is the same the kids back in the water tribe wear, the ones he promised to protect. The ones he left. It’s not worth debating. His loyalty lies with his sister, first and foremost. 

He goes to wipe away her tears, and it’s easy to repress his flinch at the gold in her eyes when they’re crinkling pitifully. 

It’s second nature to help her up, to bounce her on his knee until she’s laughing through the snot clogging her nose. He doesn’t think about lifting his mask to play peekaboo until he’s done it. 

She pauses at his eyes, and Sokka doesn’t bother trying to soften them. She’s just a child, and the look of wonder on her face is universally innocent. He doesn’t notice her hands coming up until they’re pulling at his cheeks. 

“Pretty,” she murmurs, enchanted by colours Sokka doubts she’s seen here, with the reds of the fire nation dropped into the browns of the earth kingdom. He wonders whether she crossed the sea to get here, or whether her parents did. 

Sokka summons a kind smile for her, letting her tug at the skin around his eyes. 

“Chei!” Says a woman behind them, pulling the girl into her arms. 

It doesn’t occur to him until her parents are pulling her into their robes with desperate hands and he’s furtively shutting his mask over his face that the fire nation has kids too. Has innocents. Has kids that make grabby hands at sparks instead of snowflakes and still play peekaboo halfway across the map. 

He wonders, exactly when that girl would become his enemy. 

He wonders when his prince did. 

It’s a pointless comparison. His… His nothing. Prince Zuko was raised to rule a corrupt nation insistent on causing wars, and that girl was a civilian who would grow to take her place in the world wherever she could carve one. 

He doubts his prince was ever allowed to grab at pretty things with pudgy hands. They were probably already given to him. 

It’s pointless to think of his voice cracking over “can’t” when he couldn’t quit. There’s nothing on the line for him except honour. It’s a pointless excuse. 

“Sokka,” says Aang, “you coming?” His laughter rings around the crowd. 

Sokka shakes his head, standing up from where he’s still crouched. 

“Coming,” he says, and he tries to lighten his voice.

It gets easier the more they feed him, piling his arms with food Aang pilfered with quick fingers and quick eyes. 

It gets easier when Katara pulls them into a class for kids learning showy firebending stances. She’s a natural, of course, and Sokka is piecing together all the similarities he can see between it and the kyoshi warriors. 

“Hey, look!” Aang calls, before promptly falling over flat on his ass. The kids laugh and flock to him. 

“This is what we came here for!” Katara says, but anyone listening can tell she doesn’t care, not really. Not when they’re finally having fun like this. 

She breaks out of her stance to help him up, and neither of them let go of each other’s hands. Sokka scratches at the mark on his calf before breaking out of his own. He pointedly doesn’t make eye contact with the kids as he leaves. 

It gets easier the more he laughs, and as the night goes on, there’s ample opportunities. The air is alive with magic, and he’s with his friends. 

//

Fire bending is gorgeous. They’ve pushed to the front of the mass of people staring at the stage, and though he’s a little afraid to say it, he’s not ashamed. The flame flowing out of the demonstrator’s hand is bigger than any bending he’s seen before, and it’s sliding around the sky like he’s winding a piece of twine. 

He can feel the heat on his face every time it passes him, and he’s getting better at not flinching. Whenever it turns to the sky, all the stars seem to sink into it, blotted from the sky. Breath catching against every turn it takes, he’s leaning forward. Aang is already on his tiptoes like he wants to dive onstage. 

He’s so entranced by it, he doesn’t notice Katara is on the stage until she’s on the stage, her hands reaching for a water skin she won’t find because they left it back at camp. Shit. 

He curses, tugging at Aang so he won’t do something stupid like climb onstage alongside her. 

“We have to help her!”

“I know Aang,” he looks at the crowd around them, but all eyes are on the stage, “but we can’t be seen. Okay?” 

Aang is still struggling in his arms. “He’s not going to hurt her, not in front of everyone here. She’ll be fine.” 

Aang quiets at that, but Sokka isn’t convinced he doesn’t have air under his feet already, ready to jump into action. He doesn’t let go. 

“My next trick,” the performer lets out a burst of flame, “is called taming their dragon.” The crowd oohs and ahs at all the right places. 

Sokka’s hands are tapping at his side, and he’s staring right through his mask at Katara. He can’t tell whether she’s looking back. He hopes she is, it’ll just be worse if she closes her eyes. 

The show isn’t in his realm of vision anymore, all his thoughts focused on the sister he's supposed to protect who is tied to a fire nation chair. He’s thinking up plans as fast as he’s crossing them out, and he can’t find a way where they all make it out unseen. It’s made harder by the fact one of them is on stage. 

Aang starts struggling again in earnest, and he takes a deep breath before listening to what’s happening around him. 

“The dragon!” The fire is thrashing onstage, and Aang jerks every time it gets too close. “The dragon is breaking loose!” Cries the performer, and the gasps around him are so synthetic Sokka wants to throw a punch. 

His mouth is full of adrenaline. It’s disconcerting, his brain is one step behind his body, and all his movements are jerky. 

The firebender stumbles, and Aang is gone. 

He feels like he’s missing frames. Aang’s mask is gone. Katara isn’t burned to a crisp. They’re running. There’s soldiers. Someone’s helping them.

They’re alive, and it never fails to impress him. For all the stupid risks they take, they’re doing pretty damn good for themselves. 

They’re on Appa, because they escaped. Aang has Katara’s hand in his, pressing a spot on her arm delicately, and Sokka turns away.

A pillar catches fire behind Appa’s tail, and it’s weirdly poetic, the spot of unwanted flames in the middle of a festival dedicated to it. 

Fire breaks out of control easily. Safe on the bison’s back, he wonders whether that break of control was just another part of the act. The dragon was simply flame molded to a face, it wasn’t sentient. They were just panicking in the face of the unknown. In the face of an inferno.

He remembers fire swirling around him in a moonlit forest. He swallows his fear, and he’ll keep doing it every time it comes up like bile.

He remembers the kids leaning towards licks of flame at the festival, no hesitation in their spread fingers. He remembers the invisible ring kids couldn’t cross at campfires in the South Pole. The way sparks would jump. 

Fire is unpredictable. That makes it dangerous. 

As safe as one can get travelling with the avatar, Sokka presses a hand over his thundering heart. His soulmate never seemed unpredictable in where he spreads, he follows the avatar like he’s being reeled in. But he’s uncontrollable. He’s a firebender, and that night in the forest, the look in his eyes.. he was desperate. 

Desperate people go to far lengths. That’s dangerous. He wonders whether his soulmate will be happy with the word. 

Sokka closes his eyes, and tries to count backwards from a thousand. He tunes out the chatter, and all he can hear is rushing wind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! A few things,  
> You may notice that theres a number of chapters now! This is still changing as I add and delete chapters, but I’ve planned this whole fic by chapter, and I’ll update the numbers if I make changes :)
> 
> I know I’m doing a lot of Sokka POV, there’s just not a lot of opportunity in s1. Good news is, I only have one more chapter before were on to season two, where chapters will get longer and we’ll also have more Zuko POV!! Idk what to say except its a slow burn? Thanks for sticking around! 
> 
> (PS. the reason sokka notices the similarities in between old firenation stances and kyoshi warriors is rangi! go read the kyoshi novels if you haven’t)


	9. the waterbending master

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> episode: the water bending master

Zuko can hear his uncle’s warbling voice through the metal door his good ear is pressed against. He doesn’t want to play the tsungi horn, but he does want to listen to the music. It calms his frayed nerves, the sounds of the song, his uncle’s voice, the heavy feet of soldiers light as they dance to the beat.

He pulls himself back, walking towards his room. His men need the morale, but there’s a certain level of decorum he’s meant to display as both prince and commanding officer. His uncle can handle the more emotional aspects of leadership well enough on his own.

The music follows him through the halls, echoing hauntingly through the metal. He taps absentmindedly at his soulmark. It just says boy. It feels like a reminder, like something heavier than what the word means.

For him, the fire nation prince, the words boy and soulmate are.

He keeps walking in an effort to clear his head, winding his way into the heart of the ship, the boiler. The heat is oppressive, and the smog is thick even as it’s diverted to the smoke stacks. It coats his throat.

He breathes out a puff of flame, scratching his neck on the way out. In the heart of his ship, he thinks something might be possible. The powerful thrum of the engines convinces him he could catch up with the avatar. Here, he feels in control. He could walk upstairs and order any number of things, and the crew would obey.

It’s possible.

It’s a fleeting feeling. The engine is just an engine, the same as every ship in the fleet.

//

“Princess Yue of the water tribe is now of marrying age!”

She walks into the feast like she knows the effect she has on people, courteous and careful. She walks like every step is gracing the ground with her feet. Her coat trails behind her.

Sokka gapes at her. Sixteen is hardly a teenager. Every other boy is looking too. Sokka wonders how their soulmates feel about that. He’s certain his doesn’t care.

Katara pinches him under the table like she and Aang haven’t been making gooey eyes at each other every time their eyes catch on a specifically nice piece of scenery. If not for Yue, he probably wouldn’t have looked away from the views surrounding them either.

Yue is beautiful. She’s ethereal, setting a glow everywhere she steps like she’s trailing light. It takes Sokka’s breath away everytime his eyes pass over her.

But she doesn’t smile like she trusts it. Her smile is as beautiful as the rest of her, but it’s watery and fumbling. Brief and girlish.

She comes to sit beside him, and he shakes his head quickly, trying to clear his mind. He knocks at Katara’s hand under the table, and she dutifully turns to Aang.

On second thought, he could’ve used her help with the small talk, but it’s too late now.

“So..” she turns to him at his voice, lips pressed together. Her eyes are distractingly blue. “A princess?”

She giggles, hand covering her mouth trim and proper. He wonders what she would sound like guffawing, free and careless. He wonders if she ever did.

“Yes.” Her voice is light and silvery.

“Well I’m..” he fumbles. “I’m somewhat of a prince myself, back in the southern water tribe.” It’s not entirely a lie. They were the chiefs kids, but it’s nothing like royalty here must be. He looks around at the decadence, the care with each stroke carved into ice. Yeah. Nothing like back home.

Katara is having none of it. “Really?” she snorts. “Prince of what?” She leans over him to talk directly to Yue.

“Katara,” he groans, pinching her under the table. She swats his hand away and turns back to her food, but not before sending Yue a look that has her blushing.

“I’m sure you two were very..” Yue flashes a look at Katara. “Dignified.” Katara snorts in an extremely undignified manner before turning back to Aang, but she’s staring into space past his shoulder with a dreamy look on her face. He makes a note to ask her about it before making a note not to. He doesn’t know if he can handle the way that conversation would inevitably lead to his soulmate.

He turns his thoughts back to Yue, stuffing his mouth with some food to waste time, trying to think of something to say. It tastes exactly like home and warm and gran gran’s cooking. For as much as he’s filling his stomach, it’s still cramping with homesickness.

He swallows, looking at Yue out of the corner of his eye. She’s focused herself on her own food, taking prim bites. She’s beautiful in a way that almost makes her untouchable, like she should be cordoned off.

He wants to plan a heist.

“So, do you want to do an activity together?”

She laughs, and at least five heads turn their way. She quickly covers it in her hand. He wants her to laugh, free and unbidden. He wants her to never cover it again.

He’s not sure why. It’s probably because her laugh is beautiful. It’s probably because she is.

“Yes Sokka. I’ll do an activity with you.”

He can feel the glares he's getting on the back of his neck. He can feel his soulmark there too.

//

“Do you want to go for a walk with me Prince Zuko?” His uncle asks. “It truly is a lovely night.”

Zuko wants to cause so much fire in his wake he’s propelled across the sea. He wants to run until every breath he takes fills his lungs with oxygen anew.

He sort of wants to go for a walk with his uncle. His uncle would press tea into his hands, and would offer him advice about Zhao until Zuko made it clear he didn’t want to talk about it, and then he’d make crude jokes and Zuko would almost listen.

Because Zhao took the only thing his father had given him, his crew. His chance. It still feels like he’s slipping. Like there’s sand running between all the cracks in his fingers no matter how hard he clenches them.

He remembers his mother’s hands around his on ember island, shushing him when he got frustrated. “Just let it sit in your palms. It might leave,” she kissed him on the side of his head, “but that’s the nature of sand, Zuko.” He wonders now, whether she was trying to teach him something with those words.

Because she slipped through his fingers too. And he’s holding on to the avatar so hard his fingers are bleeding but-

But. When Zhao took his father’s last gift, he took the last thing Zuko ever gave to himself.

Hope.

His fingers are twitching at his sides. He wants to go for a walk, wind back everything spilling out of him.

“No uncle. I’m fine.” His uncle gives him a small smile, the kind only he ever gets. He closes the door behind him. He leans back on his bed and calls a flame to his hand. It flickers.

He’s going to catch the avatar.

The tension in his frame tightens, and he can feel it in his fingertips. He draws on his anger. At the avatar. At Zhao. His flame burns brighter.

He lets the flame fizzle out, head dropping back into his hard military pillow.

He’s tired.

//

“You were going to marry gran gran?” Katara’s shocked voice echoes around the people gathered to watch the upstart girl fight the master.

Pakku is staring at the betrothal necklace in his hand like it’s a spirit that spun itself out of air.

“We were soulmates,” his voice is soft, but it carries around the crowd waiting with bated breath. “I loved her.” He closes his hand around the pendant.

“I think she loved me back. At one point, at least.” The ice binding Katara melts into the floor, and she takes a step towards him. He barks a short laugh. “She left anyway.”

“She left because she wouldn’t let your tribes stupid customs run her life.”

“I will train you.” Aang flies into Katara’s arms, and Sokka turns to give her a wide smile.

The crowd is cheering around them.

Sokka looks up at the curved emblem of the water tribe carved into the ice at the head of the stairs. She was his soulmate. She left anyway.

He knows it’s possible. There’s tales about people turning on their soulmates completely. Staying friends with your soulmate is a widely accepted form of soulbonds, but leaving?

All the tales he’s heard end in tragedy. They end in a warning.

His gran gran made it work, didn’t she? It’s a bitter thought. The crowd disperses, and with the absence of so many people, he can hear the wind rushing around the buildings.

“You came with the avatar, no?” Sokka startles at the voice behind him.

It came from an old woman, face folded with more wrinkles than he can easily count.

“Yes.”

She nods. “Him proposing to his soulmate was all the buzz here, back in the day.” She trails off for a moment, the way only old people ever do. Sokka waits with his hands behind his back.

“Here in the northern water tribe, people of high status are rarely allowed to marry their soulmate.” She fingers at her own betrothal necklace. Sokka doesn’t ask.

“They marry for alliances, for strength,” at her expectant look, he nods. “There’s an old saying, _Give the love the spirits gave you to your people, and let the reward lie in your yields. Let your biggest vice be that of love for a person more than people._ ”

“Do you understand?” She takes a step closer, and Sokka feels pierced by her intensity. He can’t see a single wisp of grey hair escaping her braids.

“I understand. Put your people before yourself, and find solace in the results.” He tilts his head. “Doesn’t seem much of a reward to me.”

She gives him a toothy grin. “It isn’t. That’s something people tend to see too late.”

She touches her betrothal necklace again before cupping his cheek. “Our tribe has many customs, and we learnt today they aren’t always for the best.”

“If I may ask, why are you telling me this?”

“Princess Yue is my granddaughter. I hate to see anyone blinded to their soulmate.”

He looks away, shame burning in his cheeks. “She’s not my soulmate.”

She turns up both her gloved hands. “All you have done is confirmed my suspicions,” she says, “but I believe you can show her there is more to her life than her duty.”

He bows his head respectfully. “Thank you. I have learned lots about our tribe from this conversation.” He turns away.

“I hope you solve whatever is making you so worried regarding your soulmate.”

Sokka pauses at that. “Me too.” The words feel hollow.

He counts his footsteps on his way back to Katara, brain flitting between every piece of the conversation.

“Hey,” Katara says when he joins them where they’re waiting. “What did she want with you?”

“Teaching me the intricate customs of my sister tribe.” Sokka isn’t counting his steps anymore, but he’s trying to count how many styles of windows he can see cut into the buildings they pass.

Aang laughs. “Each of the air temples have wildly different customs,” Sokka and Katara share a look at the present tense, “they even eat different things!” He bursts ahead with a shot of air.

“We’re still all vegetarians though.”

Sokka exaggerates a gag, shuddering. “Vegetables.” Katara punches him lightly.

He takes the next turn he sees. “I’ll catch you guys later,” he waves. They mumble their goodbyes, Aang already pulling Katara into a run through the tight packed city.

He thinks about Yue, her white hair glowing and offsetting the rest of her with light. A princess in every sense of the word. He wonders what she gives up to settle into that word.

He can see it in the way she covers her laughs. Her steps are the type of graceful that’s calculated. He wonders whether she was taught how to talk to people. Whether every thought she speaks is shuttered by the heavy blinds of her position.

He wonders if his prince was ever expected to marry his soulmate, or whether that part of his life was drawn out for him.

It’s not like he cares. Today he knows it’s possible. He can give up his soulmate. He remembers warm skin pressed against his as the cold of the North Pole cuts through him.

He remembers honeyed lungs and syrup blood streams. The breath he takes is scratchy with cold and salt. It doesn’t matter. This is his decision. The closest to happiness they’ll ever get is apart.

Tonight, he’ll talk to Yue. He’ll tell her he knows he’s just a peasant, (he’s seen it on his skin enough times). He’ll tell her he never expected her to notice him. (He remembers Appa’s back slick with rain in the storm, he remembers the prince that saw him, that _saw_.)

He’ll tell her she deserves more than her duty. She deserves love. She’s more than her title.

He wonders, if he stripped away duty and honour and expectations and titles, what would be left of Zuko. What would be left of them.

That’s a question that doesn’t exist in this reality.

In this one, Zuko has a title, and it’s crown prince of the fire nation. It’s not worth debating.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay this one took a while to write but its the longest chapter yet so. yay? As we get past setting ideas and feelings up in s1 to figuring out what it Means in s2, they should be getting longer and more.. substantial which is good. 
> 
> I know I said this would be the last s1 chapter, but I forgot that the waterbending master and the siege of try north were different.. next chapter is the actual last of the season one. 
> 
> I finally figured out how to use italics in ao3.. pls appreciate them it took me so long to do


	10. the siege of the north: part two

Sokka is shivering in his heavy fur parka, but he doesn’t want Yue to see, so he grips Appa’s reins tighter. He can barely see Appa’s horns in front of him in the blizzard, never mind a fugitive prince and the avatar, but it doesn’t matter. He squints into the snow digging into his cheeks like pins. 

“I’m not worried they’ll get away in the blizzard,” says Katara, “I’m worried that they won’t.” Her voice is wavering, and it's from more than the wind. 

He would laugh at the fact they could both lose their soulmates in one go, but it's not funny. 

He would laugh and say that Zuko is so incompetent he probably knocked himself out right in their path. 

He would make light of this, of the blizzard, and the fact that they lost the avatar, and the northern water tribe is under attack. They would make light of it because it’s too big for their own heads. 

But he thinks about won’t and can’t and quitting admissions made that night in the forest.

 _I don’t quit._ A pause. _I can’t._

The desperation that bled into movements where nothing else would make muscles move. They were accidental truths Sokka bets Zuko never wanted to admit, but the exhaustion dragging through his words cut them with honesty. 

Anyone who thinks that a clear head translates into truth is wrong. All a clear head does is make it easier to spin prettier lies. A head made of glass is too easily turned to mirrors, truth trapped where no one can find it. 

When it all shatters is when you find what’s left beneath. The base. The truth. 

It’s the cut Katara’s voice had when she wished her soulmate was dead, drunk off nothing but the midnight sun. It’s the edge of a breath he shared with the only boy his age in the village, hands gripped in the cold, before he left to bigger and better, Sokka’s lips left with midnight truths and leftover warmth and not much else. 

So yes. Sokka knows from experience that he was telling the truth in that instant of weakness against his own mind. Sokka recognizes it. He’s been trying to outrun his mind the minute it learned how to think. Trying to outrun the vastness of his own thoughts with the most miniscule detail he can find. It’s a contradiction that balances things out, until the next race starts. 

He looks out at the ice spread in front of him, its unforgiving vastness. 

“If there’s one thing we know about Zuko, it's that he doesn’t quit.” He casts a sympathetic look back at Katara, huddled against Yue in the cold. “He’ll survive, and we’ll find them.” 

He doesn’t add _we have to._ They all know it anyways, and he doesn’t want to think of the way his soulmark aches with it. 

So he looks out into the blizzard, and he stops thinking. 

//

Katara and Aang are hugging, soulmates reunited once again. Sokka can see from here the way their hands are deliberate, and he wonders what words they’re brushing over. 

Aang is leaning as far as he can into Katara’s plush parka, and Sokka’s soulmate is lying in a snowbank. 

Lying here, knocked out by Katara’s impressive water bending, he’s probably going to die. If he survives the blizzard, there’s nowhere for him to go on this glacier except the water tribe. 

Aang and Katara are climbing into Appa, and Zuko is lying there. 

Sokka isn’t sure why he feels like it matters. He decided, he chose, a path without him. Zuko tried to kill them. He should leave him here and not look back. It might make things easier in the long run. 

Aang and Katara are in Appa. It’s time to go. 

“Wait!” Calls Aang. “We can’t leave him here, he’ll die.” 

Sokka doesn’t owe his soulmate anything. “Save the guy who tried to kill us?” 

“It’s not right to leave him.”

Sokka swallows and stops fighting. The fire nation prince gets put in Appa, and that’s the end of that. 

//

“I am surprised that you are not trying to find the avatar right now prince Zuko.” 

The bruise on Zuko’s face is throbbing, his cuts split open from the wind and stinging from the sea surrounding their raft. He never gave his ribs a chance to heal after the explosion, and they ache with every breath. 

Zuko is alive because of the mercy of the people he’s trying to capture. 

It’s a lot. 

He stares up at the sky instead of the endless ocean. 

“I’m tired Uncle.” 

“Then you should rest.”   
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhh the last chapter of book one! By chapters we’re a third of the way there, but by word count we’re maybe a quarter. That might not seem like a lot, but normally I drop projects about a week in and I don’t see myself doing that with this one any time soon! 
> 
> Sorry for this one taking longer than normal, I realized that the worries about posting on time was affecting my writing, and I really don’t want to sacrifice speed for quality. thanks for sticking with me! 
> 
> now! Book two! Things start getting interesting!


End file.
